I think a miracle just happened!  It did not seem like a very miraculous moment at the time.  We were sitting at our dining room table playing settlers of catan with a few friends (my husband and I are a little obsessed with this game, any other fans out there?)  Jaxon (our male cat) was outside in our backyard, sitting on top of our firepit (unlit of course).

We heard a loud crash outside and we all jumped a little, “what was that?” we all wondered.  My husband jumped up to find out.  I love my husband’s protector nature!  As he opened the door that leads from our dining room to the backyard, he saw the neighbor’s pitbull lunge from across our backyard towards Jaxon.  My husband yelled and was about to grab a lawn stake to use in self defense, when the pit bull decided to leave the scene.  Rene brought a very scared kitty inside, as we all stared in horror.  He set Jaxon down, and Jaxon kept lunging for the door with a “let me at him!” attitude.   We also had to grab Sparta (our female cat) who now wanted to go outside to check on all the commotion.  Apparently she had never heard the expression “curiosity killed the cat!”

We found that Jaxon had some hair missing and one of his paws was bleeding.  My husband went outside to investigate the crime scene and left me and my friend with instructions to dip Jaxon’s paw in cornmeal to stop the bleeding.

My husband just knows these things…cat’s paw bleeding..dip it in cornmeal….oh of course why didn’t I think of that.  I had been wondering if a band aid would work on his kitty paw.

While we dipped Jaxson’s paw in cornmeal (he did not like it!), my husband found that the pit bull had broken through our fence and another neighbor’s fence to get through to our backyard.  My husband called the cops and unfortunately there wasn’t anything they could do about the situation because the pit bull hadn’t hurt a person.

Some peculiar  thoughts began to race through my brain, “pets are people too!” and “how dare the cops not be able to stand up for a member of our family!”  I was absolutely overwhelmed with how protective I felt over Jaxon and how outraged I was at this pitbull.

My surprise grew the next day when Jaxon was just not acting like himself.  When I came out of our bedroom in the morning instead of him meowing incessantly and head butting my leg, while circling around me and following me all over the house, I found him laying on the couch.  He barely lifted his head when I walked into the living room and looked at me with a glazed expression.  He looked so mournful and pitiful.  My compassion welled further when we found him after church, laying on top of our kitchen cabinets, the highest point in our house, just staring at the back door with a mix of horrific paranoia.  He laid up there for hours on end, sometimes curling up to sleep and other times hanging his head pitifully off the end staring at the door then looking at us as if to say “do you know what I have been through?”  I felt like my child had come home from school with a black eye and told me that the classroom bully had punched them for no reason.

It was as if Jaxon’s kitty innocence was gone, he had believed that life was full of cat food, cat nip, long naps in the sun and following around his “Dad and StepMom” meowing for attention.  But that night he realized that the world was full of enemies, namely pitbulls that wanted to kill him, and I could see the weight of the realization upon him.  Like the day I realized all adults weren’t trustworthy, like the day my elementary school friends decided to avoid me on the playground for no reason I could understand.  It was the day that innocence died.

It was also the day that I realized I may have begun this journey as a begrudging kitty step mom, but I really loved these cats and I would have been absolutely devastated if one of them had gotten hurt.  I also wanted to protect them from the dangers of the world.

I felt my heart changing, I felt a small miracle leap forth, maybe I was made to be a kitty stepmom. 

Maybe, just maybe we can make this work…..

Its time for my latest…Confession of a Kitty Step Mom….

Jaxon: “I laugh at your attempts to destroy me with mere water!”

Our two Bengal cats are going through the most obnoxious terrible two’s!  And I am afraid they might be in that stage permanently.  At least Sparta is semi scared of the water bottle.    So when she sees me pull it out she will normally run away and hide.  Jaxon who is the most un-cat like cat, of all the cats I have ever met, actually seems to enjoy when I directly spray his face with water.  Somedays, this is what I do…. ALL DAY….

I am working in the kitchen, making dinner, washing dishes,  cleaning ect…

Jaxon sneaks in the kitchen (he is  NOT ALLOWED in the kitchen or on the counters…because I think its gross to have animal hair near your food!) I get out the spray bottle and spray him, he shakes his head around in it for a few seconds…apparently enjoying the refreshment I have provided, leaves the kitchen, licks his skin and then sneaks back into the kitchen.

Now I realize that unloading the dishwasher is a fascinating feat , but really why does he feel the need to tromp into the kitchen and stick his face in the dishwasher?  Its like he is hoping I will turn it on so he can get a larger spray of water than my water bottle provides!

And, why is he obsessed with trying to sneak into the bathroom and to hop in the bathtub?  I am faced with the quandary of either inhaling a large dose of toxic fumes because I have to keep the bathroom door shut or keep the door open and play kitty bouncer to police the entrance of the tub while I scrub the toilet.

I have googled, “how to discipline cats” and “how to train cats” about a million times.  Do you know what most sites recommend? ????….. water bottles… that’s right…. Jaxon’s favorite activity is supposed to be a form of punishment for cats!

So I ask you, Oh wise blog readers for…. HELP!!!!!!!!!!!!  How would you “train” my cats?  Any cat lovers out there with some great advice?  Or other pet owners with some nifty tricks?

Confessions of a Kitty Step Mom….

Jaxon

It was week one of being a kitty stepmom to these 2 Bengals.  We were off to a rough start.  Already I had yelled at the cats to “Get out, get off, get away” a few…million…. times.  I had lint rolled my couch and my black yoga pants daily and I wondered how was it possible to walk through the house, not sitting on any furniture, and by the time I had sat down in my car see strands of white hairs stuck to my clean black yoga pants.  So…gross….

The cats seemed to have invaded every part of my life, every part but our master bedroom where I absolutely refused to let the cats in.  I needed somewhere at least one room where I could hang my jewelry and leave my shoes laying out without being concerned about a little kitty claw breaking or scratching.  It was a rough transition for the kitties, who on the day they gained a kitty stepmom lost their bed, as they had lived their entire lives sleeping under the bed in the master bedroom.

This new “rule” didn’t stop them from trying to get back into “their room.”  Being a new, naïve kitty stepmom, I didn’t realize how determined cats can be to sneak into places you don’t want them.   I had just walked into our bedroom and in a millisecond, Jaxon, from several feet down the hall heard the door open and had lept from one end of the hall and dived through the open door and under the bed.  I tried everything I could think of, I commanded Jaxon to “Get out!,”  I lured him with the sweetest cat lover “here kitty, kitty” voice I could muster.  He definitely wasn’t buying that one.  I even tried to bribe him with a kitty treat.  He wasn’t budging.  He sat under our bed far enough away that I couldn’t reach him, but close enough to taunt me with haughty kitty eyes his smirk saying  “this is my bed, my room and I’m not leaving!”

Sparta

Knowing my husband wouldn’t be home from work for hours but not wanting to leave the door open, for fear that Sparta might also sneak in, I racked my brain for how to lure him out.  I tried to think of anything he didn’t like.  “The guitar!” I thought, “Jaxson always runs out of the room whenever my husband starts to strum the guitar!”  I ran and got the guitar and knelt down and strummed a few chords.  Jaxon looked at me with a bemused gaze as if to say “ don’t you have anything better to do then serenade a cat under your bed?”  “Yes, of course I do!” I thought and panicked momentarily realizing I needed a new idea.

I stood up, breathing deeply and gave myself a little pep talk, “I am a college graduate, I have a master’s degree and I have opposable thumbs…. I am smarter than a cat!”  And then I remembered, I had never seen Jaxon so filled with terror then when my husband vacuumed.  So I grabbed the vacuum and walked triumphantly into the bedroom.  I turned on the vacuum and shoved it as far under the bed as I could.  But nothing!  Jaxon only moved further underneath the bed towards the center.  Warding off my growing frustration, I reminded myself that “I WAS SMARTER THAN A CAT!” and devised a new scheme.  I would leave the vacuum with headlights blazing and motor on pointing under the bed and I would close the bedroom door.  I left hoping that I the noise would drive him to the edge of his catlike instinct to wear down humans with tenacious stubbornness.  I opened the door fifteen minutes later and found a defeated Jaxon, shoulders slumped, head low, he quickly darted out of the room leaving his arch nemesis, the vacuum, behind.  Leaving one victorious kitty step mom, to celebrate a small victory…for Jaxon had learned that this was no ordinary kitty stepmom he had, she was Smarter than a Cat!

Jaxson treated me differently from that day on.  For one thing, he didn’t seem as eager to enter my “kitty free zone.”   And when I tell him to do something he does it…..about 50% of the time…I mean he’s still a cat, I’m still just a kitty stepmom not the cat whisperer.  We’re working towards that 100% but for now I will rest on the laurels of my victory.  And continue to prove that I am smarter than a cat!!!!!!!

Do you have pets?  What kind?  What is your favorite pet story?

Jesus said,  “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.”  (Luke 9:23) I thought I had experienced what it meant to die to myself.  I have been on overseas missions trips, I moved to a different city to help start a church, and worked with inner city kids while sacrificing a lot of time, money and sleep to be a part of various ministries I felt God calling me too.  I really thought I understood a lot about dying to myself, until I got married….

I know what you’re thinking, oh its a blog post about how refining it is to love your husband when he leaves the toilet seat up.  Wrong, actually I am not even sure if my husband leaves the toilet seat up…I’ll have to check next time and report back…ha, ha…just kidding…

No, my refinement has come from two very hairy creatures, one large, one small, one cute, and one who reminds me of a wild tiger, two little voices that stand at my bedroom door every morning whining for their breakfast and a little attention …two little ones, I inherited the day I said “I Do”…yes, my husband brought children into our marriage…

Here they are…

Thrilled to be a Christmas Elf…Sparta (I call her Sparta Bean.)

Now, I know what are you’re thinking, “Those spots!  How beautiful!”  “Wow are those really ???“  Yes, they are bengals …and yes they are worth a small fortune!…a small fortune I found out about when we were having a new couple over for dinner…a fortune so vast I wanted to gasp and scream when I first heard the sum spent…but because I was in the presence of virtual strangers…I gasped, lost consciousness for a brief second and then told everyone we could start eating our tacos..

Looking more like a wrestler than Santa…Jaxon (I call him Jaxy Poo)

My husband bought the cats before we were dating…actually…. correction he bought them after I broke off our dating the first time (yes, God has a funny way of making us pay for our mistakes sometimes).  My payment for being dumb enough to break up with my future husband is a lifetime of being…..the “Kitty Stepmom”

Let’s start with Jaxon.

Who needs a guard dog when your kitty has fangs!

Our relationship had a very rocky beginning.  One of the first times I hung out with Jaxon I decided to sit with my feet under a blanket on the couch, unbeknownst to me Jaxon is an avid hunter of all things blanketed.  This time it was my feet who were his prey, and his claws drew blood on my foot.  There were some other claws that wanted to draw blood at that moment, mine!…but not wanting to get in a cat fight…with an actual cat…I just shrieked and said “Ow” a lot and Rene locked Jaxon in another room.  In fact that happened a lot in our dating days, I came over and Jaxon would get locked in his room.  Its no wonder that Jaxon has proved to be my most difficult “Kitty step child.”

After we got married and I became the queen of the casa, Sparta seemed to feel the need to remind me that she was the original queen of the casa.

Queen Sparta Bean

 Every time I turn around she is climbing something  to be at the highest point in the room where she will perch, her head held high, looking down upon me her lowly kitty step Mom to remind me that she is the queen of the casa.  I don’t mind her perching so much its just her whining in the morning that is so ANNOYING…err ummm….I mean… refining to me.  See, I expect to be awoken before my alarm, if I had a rooster in my back yard, or a newborn down the hall, but not because I am the stepmom to a cat.  What she needs so desperately in the morning, I can’t even begin to understand.  She barely even nibbles at the breakfast I give her when I finally drag myself out of bed.  I think she just wants me to be awake because she’s awake.   Actually, I am getting quite good at sleeping through her incessant meows, which is good for now, maybe not so good when I have a real child.

Rene and I’s first fight as a dating couple was over the cats, and there have been many more.  They have all come down to this:  I don’t like the cats, and Rene likes the cats.  I think they are pesky, annoying and hairy, Rene thinks they are fun, lovable and cuddly.  Rene has bonded with the cats, I would rather bond with a gorilla.

Then one morning the Lord really convicted my heart about the cats.  How I was complaining about them, talking meanly to them and whining about the role of care taker I had in their life.  He told me the best way I could love Rene was to love the cats!  “What Lord!, “ you are telling me the best way to love my husband is to love the cats!  That is ludicrous!  What about making his favorite meal, what about kisses, or doing his laundry, maybe I could leave an encouraging note in his car?  Really…really….!!!!!”  But I knew I needed too.  If I showed love to the cats, I would be showing love to my husband, by valuing something he valued.

Now I know, every time I change Sparta’s  water, scratch Jaxson’s belly speak in a sweet tone to them (although I cringe because it sounds like a weird cat lady) I am laying down my life, one cat at a time.

Do you have pets?  What kind?   In what way do you think God is asking you to lay down your life today?